Joint Review | Northwest Coast Energy News

Coons says Enbridge is trying to “silence voices of the north coast”

Gary Coons, the NDP member of the British Columbia Legislative Assembly for North Coast, has told the Northern Gateway Joint Review Panel that Enbridge is “attempting to silence voices from the North Coast” by asking to limit the time of non-aboriginal intervenors before the panel.

Earlier Monday, Enbridge filed a motion with the Joint Review Panel asking that it limit non-aboriginal intervenors appearing before the panel in Prince Rupert this weekend to just 10 minutes. As well as Coons, Enbridge singled out the Member of Parliament for Skeena Bulkley Valley, Nathan Cullen, also a candidate for the NDP leadership, the T. Buck Suzuki Foundation and the United Food and Commercial Workers union.

Enbridge says that the presentations will be a violation of a panel ruling that in this phase presentations must limited to personal knowledge.

Monday afternoon, Coons responded by filing a letter with the JRP that says:

I am disappointed and concerned that Enbridge is attempting to silence voices from the North Coast riding by limiting the time for oral evidence that is allocated to non-aboriginal participants to 10 minutes.

I can assure those concerned with my oral evidence that I have done my due diligence, I’ve studied the Procedural Direction for giving evidence (Procedural Direction #4), and will fall within the parameters of such. I believe I have a responsibility, and a right, as a resident of Prince Rupert for 35 years, to share my “personal knowledge, my experiences and the potential effects of the project on me and my community” and I will, as requested, “briefly share my point of view regarding the decision the Panel should make on the Project.”

More importantly, I have an obligation as MLA to submit oral evidence on behalf my constituents and of all communities that I have been entrusted to represent. As MLA, my “community” covers the North Coast riding. I have spent the last 6 months preparing for my presentation, knowing that there is criteria set out by the panel.

It does a great disservice to me and many others for Enbridge to attempt to change the rules at this point in the process and seek to limit the participation of those of us who are non-aboriginal to ten minutes. On July 30, 2011, I applied for and received from the panel 60 minutes to present oral evidence. Is Enbridge suggesting that the panel is not experienced enough to determine who may give oral evidence and how much time should be allocated to each participant? Surely these are decisions that should be made by the independent members of the panel, rather than lobbied for by those who stand to benefit by silencing the voices of those who would be most affected by this project.

The Joint Review Panel has done their due diligence by informing all interveners through written directions and in their opening remarks at each community hearing about the nature of their role as participants in the oral hearing and the directions they need to follow. The Panel is more than able to ensure that participants abide by these directions, and have been freely doing so throughout the process thus far. There are mechanisms in place which would allow Enbridge to object to testimony that they don’t believe meets the requirements of the Panel, and the Panel themselves should be responsible for ruling on objections as they arise.

Please take this response as a request to refuse the proposal put forward by Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipelines Limited.

Enbridge asks JRP to limit Cullen, Suzuki Foundation, other non-aboriginals speaking at Prince Rupert hearings

Enbridge today filed a motion with the Northern Gateway Joint Review hearings asking that the Member of Parliament for Skeena Bulkley Valley, Nathan Cullen, also a candidate for the NDP leadership, local MLA Gary Coons and others, including the T. Buck Suzuki Foundation, be barred from speaking more than 10 minutes before the hearings in Prince Rupert scheduled for Friday and Saturday of this week.
Related: Coons says Enbridge is trying to “silence voices of the north coast”

It also appears from the motion filed by Enbridge that it seeks to limit the time before the panel both at Prince Rupert and in the future by any intervenor who is not aboriginal to just 10 minutes.

Enbridge’s letter to the JRP says:

The Joint Review Panel (“Panel”) has Community Hearings scheduled in Prince Rupert, British Columbia on Friday, February 17 and Saturday, February 18, 2012. Northern Gateway anticipates that several individuals and organizations will appear, including: Mr. Gary Coons (MLA North Coast), Mr. Nathan Cullen (MP Skeena-Bulkley Valley), the Métis Nation of British Columbia, Metlakatla First Nation, T. Buck Suzuki Environmental Foundation, and the United Fisherman and Allied Workers Union.

In the Community Hearings to date, in Northern Gateway’s opinion, the majority of the oral evidence from non-Aboriginal participants has not met the criteria set out by the Panel in Procedural Direction #4. Many of the submissions have been in the nature of argument, or have addressed matters that were properly the subject of written evidence. There will be an opportunity to provide argument to the Panel in due course.

In addition to the written directions the Panel has already issued, Northern Gateway appreciates that the Panel continues to provide directions to intervenors regarding the nature of evidence that will assist the Panel in its opening remarks at each Community Hearing.

To further assist the parties and the efficiency of the process, Northern Gateway requests that the Panel consider limiting the time for oral evidence that is allocated to non-Aboriginal participants to 10 minutes each, unless the intervenor is able to justify additional time in accordance with Procedural Direction #4. Northern Gateway believes that this would allow the hearing in Prince Rupert to conclude on Friday, February 17th, while still enabling intervenors to provide oral evidence.

The January ruling that in the first round that panel would hold “Community Hearings” has caused anger and confusion ever since the hearings began in Kitimat on January 10. The panel concentrates hearing “traditional knowledge” from aboriginal participants and “local knowledge” from non-aboriginal, but cut off all witnesses whenever they stray into what the panel considers arguments, saying they will have an opportunity to make those arguments at some unspecified time in the future set aside for final arguments.

(more to come)

Northern Gateway Pipelines Letter to_the JRP Prince Ruper Hearing

A84 Panel Commission Letter to all Parties_-Clarification of Oral Evidence and Questioning at the Community Hearings

Links: Harper, in China, vows to push Northern Gateway while attacking “foreign influence”

Reuters and Bloomberg both report from China that Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said in Guangzho that his government is “committed to ensuring” that the Northern Gateway project went ahead.”

Reuters Canada PM vows to ensure key oil pipeline is built.

Bloomberg Harper Says Canada Committed to Selling More Oil to China

The Toronto Star took a slightly different approach, headlining, Harper in China: PM blasts foreign money in oilands debate while welcoming China Harper used a keynote speech…. to slam the “foreign money and influence” behind critics of Canada’s oil sands even as he welcomed Chinese investment in Canada’s energy sector.

The Bloomberg story also quotes Harper on foreign influence, but far down in the story, reporting Harper as saying: “Will we uphold our responsibility to put the interests of Canadians ahead of foreign money and influence that seek to obstruct development in Canada.”

Reuters casts doubt on the integrity of the Joint Review Panel process by saying: “An independent energy regulator — which could in theory reject the project — last month started two years of hearings into the pipeline. In remarks that appeared to cast some doubt on the regulator’s eventual findings, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said it had become “increasingly clear that it is in Canada’s national interest to diversify our energy markets”.

China frustrated

Earlier The Globe and Mail quoted Enbridge CEO Pat Daniel as saying: “Chinese oil executives are growing frustrated with regulatory delays in plans for the Northern Gateway pipeline… Daniel said despite keen interest here in Canadian oil and gas reserves, this seemingly made-in-heaven match is threatened by delays in the company’s efforts to establish a $5.5-billion, 1,177-kilometre pipeline to carry bitumen from Alberta’s oil sands to a deep sea port at Kitimat, B.C. “They’re frustrated, as we are, in the length of time it takes…They’re very anxious to diversify their supply, they’re very dependent on the Middle East for crude.

Terrorism

Meanwhile the Minister of Public Safety, Vic Toews, on the official public safety website, lists “environmentalism” (along with white supremacy, animal rights and anti-capitalism) in an official report on terror threats to Canada, Building Resilience Against Terrorism: Canada’s Anti-Terrorism Strategy.

Foreign Funding

According to The Edmonton Journal, the Conservative MP for Fort MacMurray, Brian Jean “called for federal legislation that would both block foreign funding of the “radical” Canadian environmental movement and lessen the possibility outsiders are directly paying aboriginal chiefs to oppose major projects, such as the Northern Gateway pipeline.” See Alta. MP wants law to block foreign funding of environmentalists

Update: Peter O’Neill writing in The Vancouver Sun, has more details on Brian Jean’s accusations, including transcripts from Hansard in Tory MP Brian Jean’s corruption warning — the full story

Why did I write about this? I’ve heard completely unsubstantiated allegations relating to the efforts made to advance and oppose Enbridge Inc.’s pipeline. This was the first time I heard a politician raise this publicly, and I decided to write a story about it. I asked him if he’d be surprised if the Chinese government, which has a huge interest in Northern Gateway going ahead, might also be tossing money at First Nations to support the project. He wouldn’t touch that one.

The upshot? I think Jean’s assertion brings some whispers out of the shadows. And I think his comments might play well to the Conservative base. One of my most abrasive fans accused me of being a “shameless shill for big oil” because I quoted Jean on the matter.

Editorial: Calgary Herald calls Northern Gateway opponents “eco-pests”

You can expect a newspaper in Alberta to support the oil-patch, that’s a major part of its audience, its advertising market, its mandate. A newspaper supporting local industry is perfectly fine in a free and democratic society.

The question has to be asked: does that support include juvenile name calling, worthy of a spoiled 13-year-old? In an editorial Friday, The Calgary Herald calls the opponents of the Northern Gateway pipeline “eco-pests.”

Note I said “spoiled” 13-year-old. There are many 13-year-olds across Canada who are clearly more mature than The Calgary Herald editorial board.

Editorial: Eco-pests force government to streamline hearings

The editorial goes goes over the same old line that environmentalists are “stacking” or “hijacking” the hearings. The Herald, like the rest of the Alberta media, trumpets the expose that two people out of the more than 4,000 who signed up for the hearings are from Brazil.

Those two people from Brazil, who may have signed up inadvertently, are just .005 per cent of the total number who want speak, either as intervenors or present 10-minute comments.

So far no foreign billionaires have appeared before the hearings. Why not? After all, foreign billionaires can afford to hire all the fancy energy lawyers they need from the glass towers in downtown Calgary if they wanted to be real intervenors.

So far everyone who has appeared before what the Joint Review Panel is now calling “Community Hearings” are, to use a shopworn but applicable phrase, “ordinary people,” most of them members of First Nations directly affected by the Northern Gateway pipeline project.

The Herald says:

Regulatory reviews must be efficient and credible, and the government must not sacrifice sound environmental review for the sake of haste. But when the process becomes so cumbersome that Canada becomes uncompetitive, the federal government is rightfully forced to act.

That paragraph is typical of the coverage from The Calgary Herald going back years. Up until recently, every story in The Calgary Herald added a mandatory paragraph about “First Nations and environmentalists” opposing the Northern Gateway pipeline, without ever going into details, without ever bothering to send a reporter across the Rockies into British Columbia. Only now that there is widespread opposition to the pipeline across British Columbia is the Herald paying condescending attention. That sentence “must not sacrifice sound environmental review” is just another meaningless example of an obligatory journalistic catch phrase, added to the editorial in a vain attempt to achieve “balance.”

No wonder the media is losing credibility at warp speed.

Do you realize that while Calgary may be the headquarters of the energy industry in Alberta, Calgary itself is no where near the route of the Northern Gateway pipeline? That means that while Calgary gets let’s say 98 per cent of the benefits from the Northern Gateway pipeline, it takes absolutely none of the risk.

So while the Herald says

Warning that lengthy reviews cause investment dollars to leave Canada, [Natural Resources Minister Joe] Oliver properly enunciated a simple goal: “one project, one review in a clearly defined time period.” Imagine a process where each side presents its facts and a decision is rendered.

One has to wonder if the attitude would be any different if a major pipeline breach would mean that the entire city of Calgary would have to exist on bottled water for two or more years, a scenario for Kitimat if there is bitumen pipeline breach along our water supply, the Kitimat River (entirely possible given all the landslides here). If the Calgary water supply was threatened, how many people in Calgary would sign up to speak to a Joint Review Panel?

One has to wonder how quickly the Herald editorial board and its oil-patch loving columnists would change their minds after say just two or three weeks of lining up for those water bottles?

The problem is much deeper than that. The Calgary Herald editorial is only reflecting an attitude that seems to be widespread in the city. Over the past several weeks, there have been numerous posts on Twitter hashtagged #Kitimat, saying that because Kitimat is not within the actual boundaries of the Great Bear Rainforest, we apparently don’t live in the rainforest. Some tweets suggest that if you actually say that Kitimat is in the middle of a vast coastal rainforest, you are lying, anti-Conservative (highly likely) and (here quoting the Herald, not the tweet) an “eco-pest.”

The political agenda on the Northern Gateway pipeline is being driven by people in Alberta who live far from the pipeline route itself even in Alberta, are at least 2,000 kilometres from Kitimat, have never been to Kitimat, make up their minds by looking at maps (apparently they don’t even bother to look at Google Earth which would show all the forest around Kitimat) and won’t have to lift a finger to clean up after a pipeline breach or tanker disaster. Given attitude of many in Alberta toward taxes, they certainly wouldn’t want to help pay for the clean up either. They’ll leave it to the taxpayers of British Columbia and the people of northwestern British Columbia to deal with the mess, while again, reaping all the benefits from the energy industry.

This attitude ranges from twits on Twitter to the academic community.

About century ago, there was a similar attitude seen in academia, in the newspapers, and with the “man on the street” (since women didn’t count back then). It was the attitude in Europe toward African colonies, that the colonies existed for the sole benefit of the “mother country.”

Alberta, it seems, increasingly sees northern British Columbia as a colony, existing for the sole benefit of that province. It is likely that if some Calgary academic did some research, that academic could find a nineteenth century editorial referring to revolting colonials or rebelling natives as “pests.”

Editor’s note: A slight change in editorial perspective for Northwest Coast Energy News

When I founded Northwest Coast Energy News last May, I said at that time that I would follow the general policy of many councils, groups and organizations in northwestern British Columbia of a strictly neutral stance on the issue of the Northern Gateway Pipeline.

It has become apparent in the past few weeks that a strictly neutral stance is no longer possible. It is probably clear from anyone reading this site that, based in Kitimat, this site has a northwestern British Columbia perspective. So that is now the official policy of this site.

It seems that all the arguments from most of the media and now even an Ottawa think tank have decided that Alberta’s interest in bitumen pipeline development is equivalent to the national interest. It is not a breach of neutrality to ask whether the interests of one province are more important than those of another.

From the first two weeks of testimony in the Joint Review Hearings it is clear that a large majority of people in this part of the province believe that Ottawa and Alberta will completely override the interests and fears of the people of northwestern BC. Thus there is a need for a site that covers the interests of this region.

There are many people in the northwest who have voiced various degrees of support for the Northern Gateway Pipeline. However, speak to them, as I have, and they all say something like “provided Enbridge fulfills its promises for safety of the pipelines and the tankers.” Here the site’s neutrality will be maintained but in respect for all sides, it will continue to question the motives and promises from the oil-patch.

Are the promises from Enbridge valid and, if the pipeline is actually built, will future management of Enbridge keep those promises? (Given corporate history in the energy field and elsewhere of management ignoring the promises of their predecessors, this is perhaps the biggest question of all.)

There is a constant refrain from the conservative media and the government that “foreigners” have hijacked the hearings.

It’s easy for those who live thousands of kilometres from here, have never been here, who have never bothered study this part of the country or speak to the people, both First Nations and non-First Nations, to demonize northwestern BC. That might be good wedge issue politics, but they forgot that the pipeline has to be built across this land. In the long run, if it is to be built, that would require not just cooperation, but enthusiastic cooperation from everyone. So far, if the Joint Review hearings are any indication, there isn’t even lukewarm cooperation in the offing, rather fierce opposition.

The hearings in Smithers and Burns Lake last week both went into overtime. First Nations leaders at the Burns Lake hearings angrily complained that elders who had come through (and were delayed by) a snow storm were not permitted to speak. The JRP assured them that they would make special arrangements for the elders to speak when the panel returns in the future for the ten minute comments. So much for hijacking the hearings.

Speaking of snow, it’s been snowing non-stop in the northwest for the past four days. It’s still snowing. As witnesses at the Kitamaat Village hearing pointed out, it’s not easy to find a leak in a pipeline under three or more metres of snow. For the past few days, DriveBC has been issuing warnings for the highways in the region, highways that are well-maintained and cleared. The logging roads and access roads, which would be needed to get to a pipeline just for maintenance, much for less for stopping a breach, of course, are covered in the three metres or more of snow that has fallen in the past four days (on top of all the snow that has fallen since November)

For the past several days, (in fact for most of January) marine radio has been sending “hurricane force wind” warnings for the coast, especially in Hecate Strait.

Speaking of hurricane force winds, last week the Costa Concordia, a $450 million cruise ship with all the latest navigation equipment, the same kind promised by Enbridge that the tankers will carry, went off course, hit a rock off a small island and capsized in calm weather under the command of what was likely a rogue captain.

All of this ignored in Edmonton, Calgary and Ottawa. The vast majority of people who are intervenors and who have signed up for the 10 minute comments live in the path of the pipeline, yet the commentariat concentrate, conveniently on “green radicals” and “foreigners.” Again good wedge politics, but bad long term policy.

There have been suggestions that by the Macdonald-Laurier think tank in the person of Brian Lee Crowley that the beliefs and values can be solved with the political process.

Even if we ignore that fact that the government of Stephen Harper has, in many cases, open disdain for those who are not conservative, we have to question how much political influence northern BC has, no matter what the government.

The one riding most affected by all this is Skeena-Bulkley Valley, one of the largest ridings by land area, and smallest by population, in Canada. Even those who support the Northern Gateway pipeline, in one way or another, have little faith in Ottawa. Take such ongoing issues such as the export of raw logs or the way much of the recreational halibut season this year was wiped out by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, which appears to favour corporate commercial fishers over small recreational operations. The Harper government wants hundreds of super tankers sailing up and down the west coast and coming up Douglas Channel, and yet the same government is cutting Coast Guard and DFO resources to the bone. (The official Canadian Coast Guard response time for an incident in Douglas Channel now is eight hours. That is likely to increase with the cutbacks. The Italian Coast Guard responded to the Costa Concordia sinking in minutes.)

Even when the northwest asks the Harper government to support energy development (in this case LNG) by stationing Canada Border Services at Terrace Kitimat airport so foreign executives won’t have to land at Abbotsford first, costing them time and jet fuel, the government in the person of Public Safety Minister Vic Toews gives the northwest a not so polite brush off.

One piece of advice to Edmonton, Calgary and Ottawa. If you really want that pipeline, you’d better stop demonizing the people most affected (some of whom support the pipeline but are tarred with the same brush). That “vociferous minority” is actually a majority here.

The late American congressman Tip O’Neill is often quoted when he said “all politics is local.”

Since Ottawa, at this point, wants Alberta local politics to trump northwestern BC local politics on the pipeline issue, that means we are living in very interesting times.

That is why this site will continue to cover the issues involved as completely as time allows, from the perspective of northwestern British Columbia.

Analysis: John Wayne and Northern Gateway. How the movie star economy is vital to northwestern British Columbia

When I was a kid in Kitimat, for the sake of this argument let’s say it was 1960 and I was ten, my friends were all abuzz.

“John Wayne is in town,” says one friend.

“No way,” says a second.

“Yes,” says a third. “My Dad says John Wayne came in a couple of days ago and went down the Channel to fish.”

John Wayne on his boat — John Wayne at the helm of his boat The Wild Goose, now a US National Historic Landmark

None of my friends ever confirmed that “the Duke” had come into town. The adults did say that “everyone knew” that John Wayne had come up from Vancouver Island, gone to Kitamaat Village, hired a Haisla guide and then had gone fishing on Douglas Channel.

John Wayne’s fishing trips were famous. He was Hollywood’s most avid fisherman. He was a frequent visitor to the British Columbia coast throughout his life. (He also fished in other areas such as Acapulco.)

There’s a secret economy in northern British Columbia. The movie star economy. For more than a century the rich and famous have been coming to northern BC to fish and to hunt and to hike. Sometimes the stars and the millionaires are open about their stay. More often they slip in and no one is the wiser.

One of the lodges along the coast that caters to those members of the one per cent who like to fish, hunt, kayak or hike is Painter’s Lodge in Campbell River. On its website, Painter’s Lodge proudly numbers among its previous guests John Wayne, Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Susan Hayward, Julie Andrews and Goldie Hawn.

The King Pacific floating lodge also has movie stars among its guests each summer, and CEOs and billionaires, not just from the United States but around the world. King Pacific is well known for its tight confidentiality policy to protect the identity and privacy of its guests.

Not all the rich and famous opt for the well-known luxury resorts.

They slip in to the north incognito. Perhaps they drive up Highway 16.

These days if a movie star’s private jet lands at Terrace Kitimat International Airport, that jet would be unnoticed among all the other private jets coming and going with energy executive passengers.

A guide’s van waits close to the landing area, the star walks, unnoticed, from the plane to the van, and disappears into a small, but comfortable, lodge somewhere in the bush. A float plane lands at a secluded cove or near a river estuary. The man who gets out, unshaven, in jeans and a checked shirt could be an Oscar winner or one of the world’s successful entrepreneurs or even one of the exploitative Wall Street one per cent. Perhaps even a top of executive of a major energy company.

The guide will never tell. That’s part of the business.

So as Prime Minister Stephen Harper, contemptuously told Peter Mansbridge, when asked about the Northern Gateway pipeline: “Just because certain people in the United States would like to see Canada be one giant national park for the northern half of North America, I don’t think that’s part of what our review process is all about.”

Harper also said: “It’s one thing in terms of whether Canadians, you know, want jobs, to what degree Canadians want environmental protection.”

The prime minster, with his masters degree in economics obviously doesn’t get it. What’s wrong with a national park that supports thousands of jobs?

So let’s add up the jobs.

Enbridge’s official estimates say Kitimat will get between 30 to 40 permanent jobs from the bitumen terminal. (Other documents filed with the Joint Review say 104 permanent jobs). At the moment, Cenovus imports condensate to Kitimat, processes it at the old Methanex site and ships the condensate by rail to the Alberta bitumen sands. That means, according to local business leaders, that when the current Cenovus jobs are absorbed by the Enbridge project, Kitimat may get as few as 25 net jobs.

The jobs along the pipeline route, at least from Prince George to Kitimat, you can probably count on the fingers of one hand.

The temporary construction jobs will be in the northwest for a couple of years and then they’ll be gone.

Now what about the movie star economy? It’s been supporting British Columbia for a century.

Seven luxury lodges belonging to the Oak Bay Marine Group. King Pacific Lodge. Other smaller, luxurious lodges that aren’t as well-known or publicized.

Hundreds of small lodges up and down the BC Coast, along the Skeena River and the Nass. The lodges and resorts at Babine Lake, close to the pipeline route.

Then’s there’s the tackle shops, ranging from mom and pop operations to all those Canadian Tire stores in the northwest.

Guides and outfitters. Campsites. Gas stations (yes people up here drive using gasoline). Restaurants.

With the Harper government’s message control, and its unfortunately brilliant political tactics, Northern Gateway is no longer an argument about jobs and pipelines.

For conservatives, the pipeline debates are now a litmus test of ideological purity. Facts don’t matter.

Take for example, Margaret Wente in today’s Globe and Mail when she says: “These environmentalists don’t really care about safety matters such as oil leaks or possible pollution of the aquifers.”

Or Peter Foster in the Financial Post, who says: “Promoters of oil and gas development are in the business of creating jobs; radical environmentalists are in the business of destroying them.”

That latter statement is the now consistent refrain among the idealogues, the answer for them to why Chinese and American energy money is acceptable but money from American or other environmental foundations isn’t acceptable. And it’s false.

An oil spill, whether from a tanker or a pipeline breach would destroy thousands of jobs in northwestern British Columbia. For Wente to say that environmentalists don’t care about oil spills, simply shows she is so narrow minded that she doesn’t read the news pages of her own newspaper, much less doing some real reporting and reading the transcripts of the Joint Review Hearings where up until now all the testimony has been about safety matters and oil leaks.

So who produces more jobs in northwestern British Columbia? Movie stars? The Alberta oil patch?

Answer: the environment, the fish and the wilderness create the jobs.

The movie star economy creates the jobs.

So movie stars. Come on up. Your secret is safe with us. Enjoy the fishing.

(And I’ll bet that if John Wayne, American conservative, and life long fisherman, were alive today, he’d be standing beside Robert Redford and the other stars who are opposing the Northern Gateway pipeline).

Flanagan suggests that Harper use constitutional override clause to force through Northern Gateway

According to the CBC Inside Politics blog, Tom Flanagan, a former advisor to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, a professor at the University of Calgary and a frequent guest on CBC’s Power and Politics is advocating the use of constitutional override clause to force the completion of the Northern Gateway pipeline. You can read Max Paris’s complete blog Hard advice on Northern Gateway pipeline here.

Flanagan also suggests using the same power to “settle” aboriginal land claims. On Power and Politics he said:

[T]oughness is needed right now. You’ve got to signal that you’re serious about this. No, no, I support that completely. Other advice I’d be giving if I were asked, I’d be researching the constitutional powers of the federal government…the declaratory power which will allow the federal government to declare something to be a work for the national interest. Also a possibility of a legislative settlement of aboriginal claims.

According to the blog “declaratory power” is in section 92(10)(c) of the Constitution Act of 1867. It reads thus:

Such Works as, although wholly situate within the Province, are before or after their Execution declared by the Parliament of Canada to be for the general Advantage of Canada or for the Advantage of Two or more of the Provinces.

The blog also quotes Bruce Ryder, a constitutional law expert and prof at Osgoode Hall, as saying: “It’s a valid legal power that Parliament possesses. To use it would raise an outcry and be intensely controversial from the point of view of constitutional convention or practices that have evolved to reflect contemporary understandings of federalism that treat the provinces and the federal government as equal.”

Ryder figures Flanagan considers B.C. a bit of a wildcard in this whole Northern Gateway Pipeline business. Using 92(10)(c) is his ham-fisted… but totally legal… way of getting around any potential problems with Victoria. It’s Tom’s version of how to crush political dissent and coerce provinces.

Even the hint of a constitutional override can only increase the skepticism and mistrust of the Joint Review Panel and the process. That skepticism and mistrust has been expressed at every single session over the first two weeks, despite the futile attempts by panel chair Sheila Leggett who tries to tell people to leave the criticism until the final argument sessions.

Kitimat voices at Joint Review: Murray Minchin Douglas Channel Watch

Northwest Coast Energy News will use selected testimony from the Joint Review hearings, where that testimony can easily turned into a web post. Testimony referring to documents, diagrams or photographs will usually not be posted if such references are required. Depending on workload, testimony may be posted sometime after it originally occurred. Posting will be on the sole editorial judgment of the editor.

By Murray Minchin

I’ve been here since I was about four years old. I’m 52-ish now so I’ve been here for 48 years. I’ve left for school, went to college. I would go travelling and then — but I always came back. Like the power of this place always drew me back.

I’ve hiked almost every mountain in the region and I’ve hiked the rivers and particularly the little tiny side creeks that run down the mountain sides here. And as you drive in there’s a little tiny creek that runs into the marina at Minette Bay.

So if you’re ever back, there’s a hint to you, there’s about 12 waterfalls on that little tiny inconsequential creek that nobody ever even thinks about. I suggest you take a walk up there because it’s incredibly beautiful. This area is loaded with places like that, that are singularly beautiful on a really small scale when you step back from the whole and you go into these little tiny spots. They’re just amazing.

I’ve sea kayaked quite a bit. My wife and I spent six months sea kayaking down the whole coast of British Columbia. We did two months in the winter, two months in the spring and fall and two months in the summer. So we did six months over the whole year.

It takes about two weeks when you’re out there for just the mess — the extra stuff in your head from our society and our way of life to just kind of drop away, and after about three weeks then you begin to open your eyes and you begin to feel comfortable in a place. Like you become essentially really comfortable in the environment.

When we got to Port Hardy we booked a motel room and walked in the motel room and we sat down on the floor and we started going through our gear and started talking.

It took about 15 minutes before we realized that there were chairs in the room and we could sit on them. Like we were just so in tune with being out in the bush and — like that really changes your perception of the world. You know, like you become a little more aware.

Now, like for me, when I walk into the forest here it’s like an embrace.
There’s — it’s a palpable feeling to me that I feel completely embraced and at home in this environment.

I dropped over in the Mount Madden or into the Skeena watershed into a cirque that was surrounded by waterfalls dropping into it. So I couldn’t hear anything but the waterfalls, and as I came around the lake I heard the sound of a grizzly bear just screaming his head off and I couldn’t tell where it was coming from because the sound was echoing off the rock walls.

You know, I had to hunker down under trees and then just stop and think,
okay, like take it easy, don’t do anything too fast, take your time, make the right
choice. Experiences like that sort of show you that you — our place in the environment isn’t as strong as we think we — as it is. Like the environment has a lot more drastic effect on us than we realize.

Oh, and it was a couple of decades later I was listening to the CBC radio and I heard that sound again, and evidently it was older mature cubs fighting over a kill, cause I recognized that sound right away. But when I was out there I didn’t know, I thought it was directed towards me, possibly.

My daughter was two or three years old when I began taking her into the forest. Just past here there’s the marina, and then if you take a trail past the marina, there’s a totem pole in the forest, and you take a walk past the totem pole, you follow this trail that goes along the shoreline. So she was on my hip and we were walking through the forest.

I walked off to the side and I picked a red huckleberry off the bush and then gave it to her, and she popped it in her mouth and then, like her eyes lit up and she started jumping, you know, because she started pointing and now I had to walk through the forest to every red huckleberry bush so that she could get a taste of the red huckleberries. Now that’s part of her life and that will be part of her oral history.

On part of that trip we had a couple experiences, — on our kayak trip we had some experiences- just trying to figure a way to frame this — like yesterday at Haisla we were saying that in particular with the whales, like they’re here but in the past there was a great number of them, you know.

On our kayak trip after leaving Bishop Bay we came out on to three sleeping humpback whales, which was an amazing experience for us. But as I understand now, in the past, there would have been a lot more. And I’m really — fills me with hope to hear that they’re coming back. And it’s some disconcerting to think that that could be jeopardized in any way.

Kanoona Falls. It’s just above Butedale. Like here water is everything. we got stuck there for four days in big storms near hurricane force storms and it was raining really hard. This river was in flood; it was up into the trees on either bank and it was running completely pure, like there was no sediment in it. There It wasn’t muddy. It was just a pure river running
wild. And this is what the Kitimat River must have looked like in the past, you know, running pure in flood and no sediment.

There’s so much rain here that in mid-channel — like a channel could be two or three miles wide and there’s so much rain coming off the mountains, through the rivers and streams into the ocean that the seagulls take freshwater baths at mid-channel. It makes me wonder, scientists being who they are, engineering being who they are, the Proponent trusting their advice, has made estimations on spill response and stuff with materials and saltwater.

In the winter here you’d have to go down a foot, probably, before you find saltwater and in fact we had the sea kayak 140 kilometres south from Kitimat before salted to encrust on our decks. That’s how much freshwater is out there.

So any of the Proponent’s estimations on spill response times in saltwater, which is denser of course, should be looked at or refigured because saltwater being denser would hold the product underneath the level of the freshwater on top.

Here it rains like crazy, just suggested by the moss that you can barely see in the contrasting photograph but the forest here filters the rain so that it enters
into the rivers and the rivers run clean and the salmon and the eulachon spawn in the clean river which brings the bears; the bears carry the fish into the forest, don’t eat all of the fish and then it feeds the forest when then filters the rains for the next — for the next salmon coming up.

It snows like crazy here, like I said, you guys are really lucky that you dodged one by coming here when you did. Like four-foot snowfalls are an amazing thing to you. You know, it’s not a snowfall it’s a force of nature.

If you catch a snowflake on your tongue, one of those snowflakes on your tongue you wait for it to melt, it doesn’t and you have to chew it; like they’re twice the size of a toonie, you know, and a quarter inch thick. It’s hard to imagine but it’s a force of nature when it’s snowing like that which brings concerns about access issues, obviously.

[There are] access issues, just daily access issues anywhere, particularly on to logging roads or access roads into the wilderness, there are going to be of a great concern and even more so in emergencies when equipment and materials have to be moved anywhere.

Another problem we have here in thinking about liquid petroleum product moving through this territory is the length of out winters. The average night time low is below freezing for five months of the year and for another one of those months it’s just one degree above freezing; so things can lock up and be under ice for months at a time.

If there is any slow leak — for lack of a better term — which we haven’t been able to iron out through the information request process, you know, a spill could go for weeks without being recognized, even if the weather is good enough to get a helicopter up to fly over the area. Things could be under the ice and invisible until it gets to Kitimat and somebody notices that there is a spill happening.

This is a sapling that is growing in an estuary and it tried, I mean it tried everything it had, it had branches ripped off, the prevailing winds and it struggled but eventually it just got pushed over and died because it was in the wrong place, which I think much like this proposal and this attempt to get tar sands, bitumen from Alberta to Asia and California is — it’s just in the wrong place.

So this, to me, this is in the wrong place and this is just the first such proposal that’s reached this level of inquiry or to reach the Joint Review Panel stage, it doesn’t necessarily make it the right one and that’s really important, especially considering how much — how many forces they’re being applied to use. Well, to buy different entities to approve this project.

It’s really important to remain cognisant of the fact that this is just the first
one; it doesn’t make it the right one.

Getting back to the environmental aspect of this; this is a nurse log. You can’t see it because of the contrast of the projector. But it’s a nurse log with little tiny seedlings of more hemlock trying to grow through it. The fungus is breaking down the log. And this natural system, if it’s allowed to play out, will recover.

If we give this place a chance to recover, it will; the cumulative effects of all the industry that’s been in here and the damage it’s done over time.

It’s shocking to think in 60 years you can kill a river. And that’s what’s happened here. We’ve almost done it. Like the salmon are hanging on because of the hatchery. The eulachon are almost gone.

If we give it a chance, it can recover. The humpback whales are coming back this far into the channel. Like we saw one in front of the — I don’t know if you’ve eaten at that — the restaurant here, but last year we were here and there was one feeding right outside on the beach, just off — about 100 feet off the beach.

So if we give it a chance, it will recover. And to threaten that in any way is — morally, for me, it’s just wrong. To risk so much for so little short term gain is not part of my mindset. I can’t comprehend that.

Like this spruce on Haida Gwaii; it’s on the Hecate Strait side of Haida Gwaii. You know, it’s in from the beach a little bit but, you know, with the 120 kilometre an hour, 100-whatever an hour kilometre an hour with northerly outflow winds we have around here, even a place like this would get spray from bitumen that’s coming in at high tide.

This is a tree that’s just barely hanging on, on Cape George. It’s on the southern end of Porcher Island with Hecate Strait in the background. And it’s just an example of what things have to do here when — to try and survive when the environment is so severe.

We paddled up into here on our sea kayaking trip, we came in at high tide and we were looking up at the rocks and then back into the distance and there was still nothing growing. It was just incredible to think.

So after we set up camp, I came around here and then took this photograph because where the water is, is high tide and beach logs are normally pushed up down the line along the shoreline, you know, nice and neatly tucked against the forest by the high tides.

these are just scattered all over the rocks, and that’s because the waves there are so big in the wintertime when the southeast storms come in that, I mean, like there’s nothing living for 10 feet up and, I don’t know, 70, 80 feet back because of the continual, every year storms coming in and pushing these logs and rolling them around.

Huckleberries, beach grasses, hemlock trees, anything will — if there’s any available space for something to grow, it’s going to grow. So this just speaks to the fact that the storms here are so continual and so severe that it’s a recipe for disaster.

You get waves crashing in on — so high onto a ship that the spray is getting down into the air ducts and down into the mechanics of the ship and then you’re adrift.

It’s a different — like after you — from travelling east, once you come into the Skeena Valley and you cross over that coast Range Mountains, everything is different. All your precepts from Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, don’t matter here. There are severe environmental risks here beyond anything else in Canada.

I mean, the mountains are so young. The seismicity of the area is the area is questionable because there hasn’t been that much accumulated evidence over time. So it’s just something to be aware of.

It’s a place called Cape George on Porcher Island, which is just above Kitkatla.

There is Cape George, and this is just a storm that happened to miss us, but we were stormbound there for about four days.

I ask of you that you really consider that responsibility. You know, obviously you do, but it’s important for us to know that you, that you take that responsibility really seriously because like the — in t he Federal Environmental Assessment Review Office Reference Guide, as a guide to determining whether a project is likely to cause a significant environmental effect or not, it’s quoted as saying:

The Act is clear that the project may be allowed to proceed if any likely significant adverse environmental effects can be justified in the circumstances.

So what possible circumstances are there to risk such a place and to risk so many First Nations cultures?

So what I was saying was if you give nature a chance to heal, it will heal itself, and that’s what’s happening here and that’s what the Haisla elders were telling us yesterday, that this place wants to heal itself and it can if we give it a chance.

You know, to add more risk to the cumulative damage that’s already been done here, I think, would be essentially a crime. It should be given a chance to heal.

Another thing that Mr. Ellis Ross said yesterday was, you know, much like he’s making his own history, his oral history today and in his life, like you are as Panel Members making your own history as well and your ancestors are going to speak of what decision you made and the consequences of that decision.

Kitimat voices at Northern Gateway: Kitimat Valley Naturalists

By April MacLeod, Walter Thorne and Dennis Horwood

We would first like to thank the Haisla Nation

hosting this hearing. We recognize we are guests on Haisla land and that we are also on Haisla territory. We would also like to thank the JRP for this opportunity to make the oral presentation.
Who is the Kitimat Valley Naturalists? We are an independent Kitimat organization. We’re open to the entire community and we are an active member of B.C. nature. Our goal as a group is to pursue outdoor nature-oriented recreation.

As a group, we have 40 years of bird and mammal records and research papers. We have been involved as stream keepers, working closely with Department of Fisheries and Oceans. And we are also considered by the birding community to be citizen scientists.

We believe we have little to gain and much to lose from an oil pipeline, terminus and tanker traffic, and the purpose of this presentation is to show what we believe we have to — we stand to lose.

The focus of this whole presentation is the Kitimat River estuary and it is one of the five largest estuaries on our northern B.C. Coast. It is ranked by Ducks Unlimited as one of B.C.’s most important estuaries. And to back that up, a technical report showed it was the top three in total biological and social values.

And so everyone is clear, scientists define an estuary as much more than just mudflats and meadows. The Kitimat River estuary in fact extends many kilometres past the inner tidal areas and well into Douglas Channel.

The estuary foreshore is a relatively flat area, and at a distance, its beauty and importance are difficult to see. Up close, however, things change.

The Kitimat River estuary is 1,230 hectares, and in perspective, that’s three times larger than Vancouver’s Stanley Park. It is covered in sitka spruce, western hemlock and deciduous trees, interspersed with lush meadows, slews, ponds and rivulets.

Rich, organic soils, packed with nutrients, help create immense fertile meadows. These meadows and land support the growth of many native species.

In the spring and summer, it is a wildlife — wildflower and wildlife heaven. In early times, the root of the chocolate lily, seen in the insert, was used by the Haisla and early pioneers as a food source.

Shooting stars are just one of the many wildflowers found in the meadows of the estuary. Many people, like me, a local native, native natural photographer, I like to walk around the estuary purely for the floral opportunity of — floral photographic opportunities.

The same nutrients that allow flowers to flourish also support a major outdoor activity, fishing.

Fishers from B.C., Alberta and the world come here to fish. Why? Because Kitimat is really a fishing Mecca.

Kitimat’s river — the Kitimat River brood stock is amongst the best in the world. Where else on this planet can you catch a 27-pound steelhead or a 76-pound Chinook salmon. Elite fly-in fishing lodges located throughout the Douglas Channel target Kitimat River fish.

The B.C. sports fishing industry yields annual returns in the billions of dollars. Kitimat’s share in a year is in the millions.

Kitimat is a 10 out of 10 fishing destination. And if you don’t like our fish, try our prawns. Even celebrities know about this area and come here to fish. When the Vancouver Canucks arrive, they keep it very secret.

The Kitimat and Douglas Channel river systems have attracted recreational anglers for decades, starting in the 1950s, as you can see. Some have an extremely high profile: The Right Honourable Prime Minister John Diefenbaker, Kevin Costner, the actor, and Carey Price, a B.C. boy, our goalie for the Montreal Canadiens.

Hunters as well as fishers depend on the Kitimat River estuary. Birds, like fish, are attracted to estuaries. The Kitimat River estuary is a stopover during both the spring and fall migration. Trumpeter swans that nest in Alaska fly here and stay for the winter.

One of the major groups of migrants are waders, long-legged birds that generally feed in the shallow waters and mudflats. Over 20 species of this group of birds use our estuary as a fast-food outlet. They stop, stay for a day or two, then fly on to as far away as South America.
Twenty years ago, great blue herons were a rare bird at any time of the year in the Kitimat Valley. This blue-listed bird, meaning an indigenous species considered vulnerable, has made the Kitimat River estuary its winter refuge. Now these birds are regularly reported on Christmas bird counts.

Snow geese used to be a rare bird here as well. We now record them regularly during spring and fall migrations and in flocks sometimes exceeding 500 individuals. This estuary has become a vital link along their migration route.

Typically, many birds desert the estuary during the summer months, but we still have many species that rely on the estuary trees, meadows and waterways to raise their young.
One of the most mysterious birds in the world lives here. The marbled murrelet, a robin-sized seabird thrives in the Douglas Channel system. These birds feed by day in the rich channel waters, but at nightfall they fly inland to old-growth trees and locate their saucer-sized nest in complete darkness. No scientist, or anyone for that matter, knows how they do this.

The estuary and Douglas Channel have immense recreational values. Sailboats, kayaks and power craft all ply the local waterways. Alaska-bound yachts often divert into Douglas Channel. Why do they come here? They come here for solitude, pristine wilderness, private beaches that urbanites from all over Canada can only dream about.

Author John Kimantas predicts Douglas Channel will evolve into a world- class kayaking destination. He is considered to be the Pacific Coast authority on kayaking.

We are blessed with a network of Haisla cabins that all visitors are welcome to use. These two kayakers visit here every year from Alberta. They keep coming back. Why? They want that wilderness experience.

Within the shelter of Minette Bay, a major part of the estuary, local recreational events such as dragon boat racing and training take place. We have several non-commercial hot springs. Anyone can use them at any time of the year. They’re free.

Ecotourism on the estuary and throughout the Douglas Channel system is second to none. It is simply world class. Where else on the same day can you see three different looking bears on the same day? Lots of places have black bears, but we have Kermode bears and grizzlies a plenty. They love our salmon and we enjoy watching them fish.

Orcas regularly visit here in spring but can be seen at any time. Sea lions come and go with the fish and tides. Seals are always present in the channel, estuary and even the river. They add character and enjoyment for visitors and locals alike.

But nothing — absolutely nothing — beats the sight of a sounding humpback whale. If we lose our whales, we know we will have lost much more.

So in conclusion, the Kitimat Valley Naturalists believe we need to strike harmony and balance in our ecosystem here and, as such, we believe the Northern Gateway is not an acceptable risk. We simply have too much to lose.

Kitimat council votes to hold Northern Gateway poll sometime in the future

Kitimat District Council voted Monday night, Jan. 16, 2012, to hold some sort of poll or vote to find out whether the community supports the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline project. The timeline of the project and how the poll would be conducted were unclear after the vote.

Rookie councillor Phil Germuth had filed a notice of motion proposing that the “District of Kitimat put out a survey to residents asking them for their opinion on the Enbridge project.”

A proposed survey Germuth circulated had this a preamble that said:

As this project has generated much discussion and public awareness I feel it would be beneficial to council to know what the will of the people is. If the public is anywhere 50-50 on this then council’s position to remain neutral would be justified. However. if the public opinion is in the range of 65-35, be it for or against the project, then council may consider changing our stance.

The previous council had voted to remain strictly neutral on the controversial project.

A sample survey contained six questions that would ask if people supported the pipeline, the super tanker port, whether or not Kitimat residents would support the project if they received royalties and what environmental precautions would be wanted if the pipeline project was approved. Two questions concerned natural resources policy, whether or not bitumen should be refined in Alberta and whether Canada should process its own natural resources.

How the poll would be conducted was unclear from Germuth’s proposal. His preferred choice was a double envelope mail ballot, similar to the one used in BC’s HST referendum. He noted that a professional survey carried out by a major polling firm would be too expensive and an internet survey would be unreliable.

After the motion was moved and seconded, Councillor Mario Feldhoff immediately proposed an amendment calling for the survey to be carried out after “after the completion of the JRP process.” Feldhoff argued that Kitimat residents should be able to decision once all the evidence had been presented to the panel reviewing the project.

At this point, Councillor Rob Goffinet began asking when exactly the Joint Review Process would be completed.

Did the councillors mean once all evidence was heard, after final arguments or as the JRP report was being presented to the federal cabinet.

That question is key, since the Joint Review Panel changed the rules of procedure on January 4, 2012, a decision that has caused confusion every day of the hearings so far. The panel has split the hearing process in two, unlike the LNG hearings last June. Chair Sheila Leggett now calls testimony by intervenors “community hearings,” and is restricted to “personal experience.” Any questioning of witnesses is postponed until a round of final arguments.

Feldhoff’s amendment was adopted, but without any clarification of what the motion meant by “completion of the JRP Process.” Council then voted for the motion to hold the poll.

There is more uncertainty now surrounding how the Joint Review Panel is proceeding, the rules have already changed once. Prime Minister Stephen Harper is still threatening to stop certain groups, with US funding support, from participation in the review process, although how he could do that and leave the panel with any credibility and independence is also uncertain.

Any attempt by Harper and his government to block people or groups appearing before the JRP may result in a court challenge, which might delay the “completion” even further, contrary to the wishes of the government and the oil patch.

That means the date of any poll in Kitimat would also be uncertain.

Germuth argued repeatedly that is likely that the majority of people in Kitimat have already made up their minds.